We then leave Fajardo and head for San Juan to join daughter Susan and her family.  They have been in Puerto Rico for a day or so.  We checked into the Tress Palmas Guest House just across the street from the Atlantic Ocean. This is a nice hotel.  Susan and family returned to the hotel shortly after we arrived.  We had a nice reunion.

The next morning Susan, Ram, Rajan, and Maya took off for the El Yunque rain forest.  The three year old, Jay, stayed with us.  We checked out of the hotel and drove to Old San Juan and the San Cristobal Castle, one of the two main fortresses of Old San Juan.  The four of us spent quite a bit of time in the old city and this interesting fortress.

After leaving the fortress we drove to the Caribe Hilton Hotel to check in for the next three nights.  This was more of a problem than anticipated, as the room was registered in our daughter's name.  The first clerk would have nothing to do with us and sent us away.  I went back to another clerk with our tale of woe, even showing her our tired, three year old Jay, and pleaded for mercy.  We had no idea when Susan etal would return.  The woman was friendly, gracious and checked us into the room,  She said, "I love children, I will take care of you".  There was about an hour wait to get into the room.  There were 'parrots' in the lobby.  Jay loved them, a man came and feed them watermelon, and he also fed Jay some.  We took advantage of the Corporate Reception Room for drinks and snacks before checking in.

 The next afternoon we headed towards the other fortress, the El Morro Castle.  Parking near the fortress was impossible, so we drove through the narrow streets of Old San Juan to the cruise ship docks.  We then walked to a free trolley stop and got a ride to El Morro.  This also was a very interesting fort. The design is fascinating and it has served San Juan well.  After our extensive tour, we walked back to the trolley stop for our ride back to our car.  The trolley ride from our car to El Morro was about 10 minutes.  The trolley ride back to the car was about an hour.  It was only that fast because the driver drove a block or two the wrong way on a one way street to get around a huge traffic jam.  Very narrow streets and heavy traffic make for slow movement.

The rest of the time we were in San Juan, Susan and Ram were at the AIB Conference, thus the three children were with us most of the time.  We sat in on Susan's presentation and found it very interesting.  People do actually listen and have questions afterwards.

The three children spent about all the rest of their time at the beach or the pool.  Of course we were with them.  One evening Kay and  i went to a casino in the closest building in the picture below.  It was a very nice 19 minute walk at night across a bridge.  There were many people on the bridge, families, fishermen, couples enjoying talking and watching the water go by.  Marlene stayed with Maya and Rajan with Jay.

San Juan skyline from our hotel.	Old San Juan.  Looking from San Cristabol castle to El Morro.
	Note the colorful buildings, narrow streets and pretty view.
Jay, Maya, Susan and Rajan	Ram and Susan
Tres Palmes Guest House, across the street from	Marlene outside the Caribe Hilton
the Atlantic Ocean.

On checkout morning Richard hit his head on a door handle in the shower.  Gosh head wounds bleed.  A doctor came to the room and cleaned, glued and bandaged the wound.

Then we drove to the airport for the flight home.

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Last revised: 28 July 2002